


entropy

by astarisms



Series: natan week 2019 [6]
Category: Satan and Me (Webcomic)
Genre: F/M, Hell, Introspection, Prompt Fic, Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-16
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-09-01 20:15:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20263894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astarisms/pseuds/astarisms
Summary: she upsets the order of everything — even what it means to be the devil





	entropy

**Author's Note:**

> apparently ao3 ate this one the first time i uploaded it, so here it is

Lucifer has housed Hell for centuries. **  
**

The screams of the damned, the clawing fingers wrestling for control, the telltale thrum of souls just under his skin waiting to break free are all abysmally typical sensations, but that doesn’t make them any less horrifying. 

He learns to drown it out, to reduce their chaos to background noise, but they’re always there, lying in wait, ready to drag him down and make him like them. 

Sometimes they slip through, in high pitched, demented whispers. They want to drive him insane. They want him to lose control so they can take over and tear him and everything he’s ever loved to shreds while he’s forced to watch, a passenger in his own body. 

He keeps his distance from his followers for a reason. Getting attached is a weakness, not just against Heaven, but against himself and the monster that lurks inside of him. 

It’s in Oregon, sitting by the smoldering path in the forest he’d carved, that he realizes it is far too late with the girl. He wants to hate her, to push her away, to sever all his ties with her and never look back.

_Lucifer_, they croon in her voice, and he can’t help but lean into it. The tittering laughter sounds far away, and it takes him a long moment to recognize the deranged gleam in her eyes, to realize that this isn’t her and the childish giggles aren’t far away at all, but under his skin, in his ears, on her lips. 

His head falls into his shaking hands and he grits his teeth, feeling himself slipping. He strains, trying to regain control, but it feels like he’s trying to cup water with his fingers spread. He hasn’t let Hell get the better of him in decades, maybe even a century, and he’ll be damned if he lets it because of her.

There are phantom hands tugging at him, nails raking over his skin, _yes, yes, you will be damned, you will join us, you will know what it’s like to_ **SuF_fEr_ aS We _Ha_Ve**. Lucifer swallows a scream, represses the urge to bury his claws where he feels them and _get. them. out. _

He will not be broken by a girl too loud and too trusting for her own good. He will not succumb because their stupid contract is pulling him back to her, unraveling the little sanity he has left, or because he can still so clearly see the bright hurt in her eyes when he’d told her to fuck off, or—

_Oh, Lucifer_, they coo again, soft and sweet, and he looks up despite himself. The image of her has shifted, and she takes up his entire vision on her knees, framed in flames. _Monster_. 

It is a losing battle. 

He trembles as it consumes him, but not before he thinks,_ she is dangerous. _

x

This time, when Hell comes surging up to claim him, he lets it. 

There’s barely time to make the decision because within moments of stepping into the warehouse the rage he’s barely kept in check is bubbling to the surface and he doesn’t stop it. Hell is right there on the edges, riding the wave until it’s bursting out of his skin. 

The scar has faded from his arm already, but the blood still lingers, crusting as it dries, and he’s made even more furious by the fact that he knows Natalie’s will likely leave a mark for a long time to come.

_How dare he_. Hell echoes the thought in increasingly enthusiastic shouts, until their thoughts consume his and he lets himself be pulled along for the ride because for once, they’re in agreement. 

He cuts through the rest of the humans and his traitorous followers in the same fashion, those willing to bend the knee to a fraud being unworthy of a more extravagant death. The voices in his head cheer indiscriminately at the bloodshed, delighted and hungering for more. 

And when they find him, Lucifer’s anger fuels them, riles them up further, and he doesn’t even try to regain control. He relishes the snap of Jericho’s bones, the boy’s screams and his tears. It’s music to his — to _their_ — ears, at least until…

_Lucifer_. 

It cuts through the chaos, her voice, like a balm. His anger abates when he looks up and sees her, her cheeks smudged with soot, her hair singed, the bandage around her arm dotted with red. But she’s whole and she’s fine, and the relief nearly staggers him.

It certainly makes him aware of the hold that Hell has over him now, more aggressive and unyielding than they’ve ever been since he had all but submitted to them, and there’s a moment of panic where he doesn’t think he can break free.

_We’ve got you now_, they chant merrily, laughing in the voices of thousands of gleeful children. It grates like nails on a chalkboard against his mind. _Not this time, Lucifer_, they sing as he strains to pull himself back into his own body, to regain his autonomy. **We _HavE_ _YO_u No_W_**.

And then it’s gone. Everything is gone. The pull on his consciousness, the hands clawing at him from the inside out, the voices. The crackle of the fire is suddenly deafening, but it pales in comparison to what’s been living in his head for centuries. He watches as Hell fades from the tips of his fingers, feels its presence retreat. Not to the background noise he’d reduced it too, but a deeper silence that makes his knees weak. He looks up at Natalie in shock, flexing his limbs to make sure he’s himself again. 

She smiles, weak and exhausted and looking for all the world like she’s happy to see him. 

_She is dangerous_, he recalls thinking all those months ago. But she is no danger to him. She is dangerous to Hell, to the apocalypse, to all his carefully laid plans, but not to him.

Exhilarated and unburdened in a way he has not been in a long time, he crosses to her side. 

_Hell will have her_, comes the second startling revelation when they make their escape from the burning warehouse, and then something fiercer in him rises up and says, _no_. 

He won’t let Hell have her. He won’t let the damned scar her, not like they have scarred him. 

She rests against him, and he looks down at her in his arms, though she doesn’t notice with her eyes closed. 

She has too many scars from him already.


End file.
